what newspapers does alden global capital own

In early 2011, Alden was still considered a non-controlling investor, but by the end of the year, that would change. Ken Kelleher is an American sculptor. "The question is, will local communities decide that this is an important issue, that it's worth saving these newspapers, protecting them from firms like Alden, or will they decide that they don't really care?" A century later, the Tribune Tower has retained its grandeur. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital, one of the country's largest newspaper owners with a reputation for intense cost cuts and layoffs, has offered to buy the local newspaper chain Lee Enterprises . [4][5] The company added more newspapers to its portfolio in May 2021 when it purchased Tribune Publishing and became the second-largest newspaper publisher in the United States. Alden Global Capital revealed a proposal Monday to purchase Lee Enterprise Inc. and its newspapers at $24 a share, casting alarm through the many newsrooms owned by Lee. These were not exactly boom times for newspapers, after allat least someone wanted to buy them. The firm has a history of purchasing newspapers to cut costs wherever . When the Chicago Tribune held a Save Local News rally, most of the people who showed up were members of the media. They were very tight. Freeman has resisted elaborating on his relationship with Smith, saying simply that they were family friends before going into business together. And when Chicago suffered a brutal summer crime wave, the paper had no one on the night shift to listen to the police scanner. But I had underestimated how little Aldens founders care about their standing in the journalism world. The men killing Americas newspapers, how Slack upended the workplace, and the new meth. [4] [5] The company added more newspapers to its portfolio in May 2021 when it purchased Tribune . [27] The Alden lawsuit asserts that the members of the Lee board "have every reason to maintain the status quo and their lucrative corporate positions" and that they are "focused more on [their] own power than what's best for the company. Freeman was clearly aware of his reputation for ruthlessness, but he seemed to regard Aldens commitment to cost-cutting as a badge of honorthe thing that distinguished him from the saps and cowards who made up Americas previous generation of newspaper owners. At one point, he told me, the citys entire civil-service commission was abruptly fired without explanation; his sources told him something fishy was going on, but he knew hed never be able to run down the story. Freeman never responded. The scene was somehow even grimmer than Id imagined. It hurts to see the paper like this, he told her. John Temple: My newspaper died 10 years ago. Russ Smith is a puckish libertarian whose self-described contempt for the journalistic class animates the pages of the publication. Next year, Bainum will launch The Baltimore Banner, an all-digital, nonprofit news outlet. I knew they almost never talked to reporters, but Randall Smith and Heath Freeman were now two of the most powerful figures in the news industry, and theyd gotten there by dismantling local journalism. The purchase represents the culmination of Alden's years-long drive to take over the company and its storied titles . Craigslist killed the Classified section, Google and Facebook swallowed up the ad market, and a procession of hapless newspaper owners failed to adapt to the digital-media age, making obsolescence inevitable. "[26] Shortly thereafter, Alden Global, through its operating unit Strategic Investment Opportunities, filed a lawsuit in state court in Delaware against Lee Enterprises. The Tribune Tower, the iconic former home of the Chicago Tribune, seen in Chicago, Illinois in 2015. Alden, which already owned one-third of . Meanwhile, in Vallejo, John Glidden went from covering crime and community news to holding the title of the only hard news reporter in town, filling a legal pad with tips he knew he'd never have time to pursue. Traditional newspaper business model says you make 95% of your money off ad sales and the rest off subscriptions. by Magnus Shaw..An enormous advertising company (Leo Burnett) and a small creative film company (Asylum) have had a difficult couple of weeks. Have you heard of the hedge fund Alden Global Capital? It wasn't the first newspaper acquisition for this hedge fund firm, nor is it the only firm of its kind eyeing the nation's newspapers. The editor in chief mysteriously resigned, and managers scrambled to deal with the cuts. The Tampa Bay Times has sold its printing plant at 1301 34th St. N to a real estate arm of Alden Global Capital, a New York hedge fund that is the second-largest newspaper owner in the country. When plans for the building were announced in 1922, Colonel Robert R. McCormick, the longtime owner of the Chicago Tribune, said he wanted to erect the worlds most beautiful office building for his beloved newspaper. Updated May 21, 2021 at 2:13 PM ET. Coppins describes Alden as a specific type of firm: a "vulture hedge fund." On the appointed afternoon, I dialed the number provided by his spokesperson and found myself talking to the most feared man in American newspapers. It was founded in 2007 by Randall D. A recent Financial Times analysis found that half of all daily newspapers in the U.S. are controlled by financial firms, and Coppins says that number is all but certain to keep growing. In the for-profit news arena, Knight is spurring the digital transformation of local newsrooms through the Knight-Lenfest Newsroom Initiative, Sherry said. As a reporter whos covered Alden Global Capital for more than two years, people often ask me who are the investors behind the hedge fund that owns one of Americas largest newspaper chains? He says he visited the Tribune's office and was "really shocked by how grim the scene was." Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link. Prior to the acquisition of the Tribune Company, we purchased substantially all of our newspapers out of bankruptcy or close to liquidation, he told me. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital, known for making deep newsroom cuts, won approval to acquire Tribune Publishing, which includes the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun and New York Daily News. G ARY MARX and David Jackson, two veteran investigative reporters at the Chicago Tribune, spent most of last year seeking potential buyers who might save their newspaper from Alden Global Capital . When I asked Freeman what he thought was broken about the newspaper industry, he launched into a monologue that was laden with jargon and light on insightsummarizing what has been the conventional wisdom for a decade as though it were Aldens discovery. Alden Global Capital already had a 32% stake in Tribune Publishing, which owns famous names like the Tribune, Daily News, the Hartford Courant and others, and on Tuesday announced it would pay . With its acquisition of Tribune Publishing earlier this year, Alden now controls more than 200 newspapers, including some of the countrys most famous and influential: the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun, the New York Daily News. The hollowing-out of the Chicago Tribune was noted in the national press, of course. Some expressed exasperation with the staff of the Chicago Tribune, who were unable to find a single interested local buyer. Alden, which owns more than 200 newspapers across the country, has developed a reputation for using extensive layoffs and severe cost cuts at the newspapers it owns. After a contentious presidential race and amid a still-raging pandemic, there was a limited supply of outrage and sympathy to spare for local reporters. It . We must finally require the online tech behemoths, such as Google, Apple, and Facebook, to fairly compensate us for our original news content, he told me. (Freeman denied this through a spokesperson.) The Tribune had been profitable when Alden took over. Its World War II correspondent brought firsthand news of Nazi concentration camps to American readers; its editorial page had the power to make or break political careers in Maryland. [8][24] Tribune Publishing publishes nine major metropolitan dailies. Heath Freeman in an undated photo provided by Goldin Solutions . When John Glidden first joined the Vallejo Times-Herald, in 2014, it had a staff of about a dozen reporters, editors, and photographers. Probably not.. He had spoken on this issue before, and it was easy to see why. The model is simple: Gut the staff, sell the real estate, jack up subscription prices, and wring as much cash as possible out of the enterprise until eventually enough readers cancel their subscriptions that the paper folds, or is reduced to a desiccated husk of its former self. If you went into a lab to create the perfect bro, Heath would be that creation, says one former executive at an Alden-owned company, who, like others in this story, requested anonymity to speak candidly. Vallejo deserves better. A few weeks after the story came out, he was fired. Heath hopes the well never runs dry, but hes going to keep pumping until it does. The 21st century has seen many of these generational owners flee the industry, to devastating effect. [30], Alden Global Capital includes a real estate division called Twenty Lake Holdings, which primarily buys excess real estate from newspapers. During its five-year run with Alden, it seems quite unlikely that no one at Knight knew about the hedge funds slash-and-burn strategy for two reasons. The $633 million sale made Alden the nation's second largest newspaper owner in terms of circulation, with more than 200 newspapers. Read: Local news is dying, and Americans have no idea, From 2015 to 2017, he presided over staff reductions of 36 percent across Aldens newspapers, according to an analysis by the NewsGuild (a union that also represents employees of The Atlantic). According to Aldens scarce SEC filings, it currently has fewer than 10 investors, most of them from overseas. But who most of those few souls are, and how much of the hundreds of millions skimmed from DFM papers theyve received remains a deep, dark mystery. In the Hyatt meeting, Ted Venetoulis, a former Baltimore politician, advised the reporters to pick a noisy public fight: Set up a war room, circulate petitions, hold events to rally the city against Alden. Its being snuffed out, quarter after quarter after quarter. We were sitting in a coffee shop in Logan Square, and he was still struggling to make sense of what had happened. (Freeman has, in the past, disputed Bainums account of the negotiations.) The new owners did not fly to Chicago to address the staff, nor did they bother with paeans to the vital civic role of journalism. In the face of that setback, Alden said it would turn to the tactic of filing a proxy statement asking the company's shareholders to vote no on board members Mary Junck and Herbert Moloney during the March 2022 board elections. Tuesday, 23 November 2021 07:46 PM EST. These papers were in many cases left for dead by local families not willing to make the tough but appropriate decisions to get these news organizations to sustainability. Alden Capital's gutting of the Denver Post is the most discussed example of this, but there are many others. Gerry Smith. But most of them also had a stake in the communities their papers served, which meant that, if nothing else, their egos were wrapped up in putting out a respectable product. Some of these papers likely would have been liquidated if the fund had not stepped in to buy them, as Alden's president told Coppins. So why be surprised that Knight-Ridder or anyone else is investing in destructive but profitable ventures? Its a hedge that went and bought up some titles that it milks for cash.. At their worst, they used their papers to maintain oppressive social hierarchies. All good works, and Knight is to be commended for them. Below are highlights from his conversation with Morning Edition's A Martnez. In 2011, Paton launched an ambitious initiative he called Project Thunderdome, hiring more than 50 journalists in New York and strategically deploying them to supplement short-staffed local newsrooms. AP. Alden's holdings already spanned the country, including the . Alden Global Capital, the New York hedge fund that bought Tribune Publishing this year, said on Monday that it was making an offer for another big American newspaper chain, Lee . The 5 global Trends in Journalism: 1 We've moved from a world where media organizations were gatekeepers to a world where media still creates the news agenda, but platform companies control access to audiences 2 this move to digital media generally does not generate filter bubbles Instead automated Serendipity + incidental exposure drive people . But for that to happen, the Big Tech money would need to flow to underfunded newsrooms, not into the pockets of Aldens investors. A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms. NPR reached out to Alden for a response. Much of the Knight family's once-grand newspaper empire was ultimately acquired by Alden Global Capital, while the family foundation invested in Alden funds. Aldens website contains no information beyond the firms name, and its list of investors is kept strictly confidential. Shareholders of Tribune Publishing, one of the country's largest newspaper chains, on Friday approved a takeover by hedge fund Alden Global Capital. That's because the fund is stepping in to buy and then gut newsrooms across the country. You need real capital to move the needle, he told me. More to the point, Tribune Publishingwhich represents a substantial portion of Aldens titleswas profitable at the time of the acquisition. Prior to the buildings completion, McCormick directed his foreign correspondents to collect fragments of various historical sitesa brick from the Great Wall of China, an emblem from St. Peters Basilicaand send them back to be embedded in the towers facade. If you want to know what its like when Alden Capital buys your local newspaper, you could look to Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, where coverage of local elections in more than a dozen communities falls to a single reporter working out of his attic and emailing questionnaires to candidates. My request for an interview with Smith was dismissed by his spokesperson before I finished asking. That gave the journalists at the Sun a brief window to stop the sale from going through. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital will acquire the rest of what it does not already own of Tribune Publishing, owner of the Chicago Tribune, the New York Daily News and other local newspapers . At the time, finalternatives.com reported that the Global Distress Opportunities fund would focus on financial firms as well as homebuilding, gaming and auto-related names.. . For Freeman and his investors to come out ahead, they didnt need to worry about the long-term health of the assetsthey just needed to maximize profits as quickly as possible. From the March 1914 issue: H. L. Mencken on newspaper morals, A story circulated throughout the companypossibly apocryphal, though no one could say for surethat when Freeman was informed that The Denver Post had won a Pulitzer in 2013, his first response was: Does that come with any money?. Some in the city started to wonder if the paper was even worth saving. He took particular pride in finding novel ways to give away his family fortune, funding child-poverty initiatives in Baltimore and prenatal care for women in Liberia. Or to nearby Monterey, where the former Herald reporter Julie Reynolds says staffers were pushed to stop writing investigative features so they could produce multiple stories a day. Some people believe that local newspapers will eventually be replaced by new publications, which Coppins describes as "built from the ground-up for the digital era." Iowa-based Lee Enterprises asks investors to help fight off hedge fund Alden Global Capital. . One, the warning shot was fired in 2011, in a Poynter Institute article titled Who is investor Randall Smith and why is he buying up newspaper companies? Randall Smith is the co-founder of Alden, together with his young protg, Heath Freeman, and has been called the grandfather of vulture investing. Vulture funds by definition dont reinvest in their properties they suck them dry. Media . "[28], In mid-February 2022, the Delaware court found in favor of Lee Enterprises. Well, he told me, they have some very good reporters., This article appears in the November 2021 print edition with the headline The Men Who Are Killing Americas Newspapers., A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms, I Dont Know That I Would Even Call It Meth Anymore, W. G. Sebald Ransacked Jewish Lives for His Fictions. Alden began its acquisition of Tribune Publishing in 2019, when they paid $117.9 million to Michael Ferro for his 25.2-percent stake. But by 2014, it was becoming clear to Aldens executives that Patons approach would be difficult to monetize in the short term, according to people familiar with the firms thinking. This is predatory.. It was like watching a slow-motion disaster, says Gregory Pratt, a reporter at the Chicago Tribune. Today, we know that Knight, CalPERS and others no longer invest with Alden. Rapid-fire changes underway at newspapers sold to cost-slashing hedge fund Alden Global Capital have led to a profound case of the jitters at newsrooms like the New York Daily News. She was writing about Aldens growing newspaper empire, and wanted to know what it was like to be the last news reporter in town. One known investor, however, is the Randall and Barbara Smith Foundation, named for Alden founder Smith and his wife. [3] [4] With its acquisition of Tribune Publishing in late . Its the meanness and the elegance of the capitalist marketplace brought to newspapers, Doctor told me. Financially, it was a raw deal. Instead, they gutted the place. At the same time, he increased subscription prices in many markets; it would take awhile for subscribersmany of them older loyalists who didnt carefully track their billsto notice that they were paying more for a worse product. Maybe theyd cancel their subscriptions eventually; maybe the papers would fold altogether. It seemed reasonable to ask that they answer a few questions. He studied art at Alfred University under sculptors Glenn Zweygardt and William Parry. The 1% own and operate the . Its hard to imagine theyd show, anyway. It's traded in a prestigious downtown newsroom for a "Chipotle-sized office" near the printing press. | Michael Gray, WIkimedia Commons. He can cite decades-old scoops and tell you whom they pissed off. My answer is its hard to know. Shares of Lee Enterprises Inc. rose sharply Monday after hedge fund Alden Global Capital LLC offered to buy the newspaper publisher for about $141 million. The pay was terrible and the work was not glamorous, but Glidden loved his job. The New York-based hedge fund Alden Global Capital - known for slashing its newspapers' budgets to extract escalated profits - won shareholder approval Friday for its $633 million bid to acquire the Tribune Publishing newspaper chain.. Hedge fund Alden Global Capital, one of the country's largest newspaper owners with a reputation for intense cost cuts and layoffs, has offered to buy the local newspaper chain Lee Enterprises for . I felt like a terrible reporter because I couldnt get to everything.. What exactly went wrong would become a point of bitter debate among the journalists involved in the campaigns. [4], Alden purchased a 5.9-percent stake in Lee Enterprises in January 2020. City budgets balloon, along with corruption and dysfunction. It is the nations second-largest newspaper owner by circulation. Freemans father, Brian, was a successful investment banker who specialized in making deals on behalf of labor unions. They call Alden a vulture hedge fund, and I think thats honestly a misnomer, Johnson said. In May, the Tribune was acquired by Alden Global Capital, a secretive hedge fund that has quickly, and with remarkable ease, become one of the largest newspaper operators in the country. On more than one occasion, according to people I spoke with, he asked aloud, What do all these people do? According to the former executive, Freeman once suggested in a meeting that Aldens newspapers could get rid of all their full-time reporters and rely entirely on freelancers. In May 2021, Tribune Publishing finalized its sale to Alden, after having announced in February 2021 that it intended to pursue this path.

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